By - The Kentish plover (Charadrius alexandrines) is a widespread shorebird and a constant winter visitor to Sri Lanka and neighboring India, yet a population chooses to remain year-round in Sri Lanka and southern India.
- This population has physical characteristics different from the migratory Kentish plovers, hence it has been identified as a subspecies, known as C. a. seebohmi. As far back in 1887, British ornithologist Henry Seebohm suggested they could possibly be a distinct species.
- A recent study of genetic analysis has established this breeding population of plovers found in Sri Lanka to be different from the migratory Kentish plovers; the new species’ evolution started about 1.19 million years ago after the population separated from its ancestors.
- The new species is named Hanuman plover (Charadrius seebohmi) named after the Hindu mythical ape god Hanuman revered in the Sanskrit epic Ramayana who supposedly built a bridge linking Sri Lanka and India, incidentally where the first specimen of this bird was collected.
The ancient Sanskrit epic Ramayana has it that Hanuman was a mighty ape god who marshaled an army to build a bridge linking northern Sri Lanka’s Mannar region with South India’s Rameswaram. Several hundred years later, a small bird species new to science is named as the Hanuman plover, as it lives and was found in the vicinity of the mythical bridge and it’s the first specimen to help distinguish the plover from other shorebirds.
“We selected Hanuman plover as the bird’s common name to celebrate the mythology linked to the native land of this plover,” says Sampath Seneviratne, a professor in zoology attached to the University of Colombo who conceptualized the study. The bird is scientifically categorized as Charadrius seebohmi honoring Henry Seebohm, the British ornithologist who, as far back as 1887, first suggested the Sri Lankan breeding population could be a possible distinct species, Seneviratne told Mongabay.
The Hanuman plover was initially thought to be a subspecies of the Kentish plover (Charadrius alexandrinus), hence scientifically categorized as Charadrius alexandrinus seebohmi, in 1848. The Kentish plover is a common shorebird found in Eurasia and North Africa, and those that breed north of 40° latitude are the winter migrants. Kentish plovers migrate to Sri Lanka in large numbers and fly back to breeding grounds after the migratory season — except one population that chooses to remain in the Indian Ocean island throughout the year.
Some migratory birds, known as the “loiterers,” do not go back for a season or two, but this Sri Lankan and South Indian population is quite different, as the birds also breed. Whenever he spotted a Kentish plover outside the migratory season, Seneviratne was driven by curiosity about where they come from and why they appear to breed on the island.
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